Posted
by
CowboyNeal
on Thursday September 21, 2006 @09:47PM
from the off-into-the-wild-blue-yonder dept.

jonerik writes "Though it's not being widely reported, this week marks the end of the line for the F-14 Tomcat in US Navy service. First flown in 1970, the Grumman F-14 Tomcat was easily one of the world's most powerful, advanced, and deadly aircraft for many years, capable of flying at Mach 2.3 and firing its half-dozen Mach 5 AIM-54 Phoenix air-to-air missiles at targets as much as 100 miles away. Having been gradually replaced during the last several years by the newer F/A-18E/F, the last of the aircraft in US service will be officially retired on Friday, September 22nd in a ceremony at Virginia's Oceana Naval Air Station. However, at least a few F-14s will continue to fly for a few more years: Iran — which took delivery of 79 aircraft before the overthrow of the Shah — still flies the plane, though only a small number (perhaps ten or twenty) are believed to still be in service due to a lack of spare parts and attrition."

> Not to mention we won't have to think of "Danger Zone", "you've lost that loving feelin'" (when he sings it), and we won't have to think of Navy training jets as MIGs anymore!

But we'll never forget Sega's 2-degree-of-freedom arcade game After Burner II [wikipedia.org].

It came out one year later, had the same sprite-scaled love that Space Harrier great, and it had a soundtrack better than the movie that indirectly inspired it. When the enemy fighter appeared behind you, you could indeed "hit the brakes, he'll fly right by me" and blow the guy away. Suicide in any actual air-to-air encounter, but it made for great coin-op lovin'...

The pattern is full... but negative, Ghostrider, neither is the coin box in my basement arcade. Don't ask how I got it down got there, and I won't tell you you have to land until Stage 23.

First of all this is a legit maenuver known as Cobra [wikipedia.org]. F14 was the only old US aircraft that could do a small one (around 30 degrees), F15-18 cannot do it (until they get a vector upgrade one day).

Second it is suicide only with older US aircraft (dunno about newer ones) as they follow a different doctrine of engagement from the current Russian one. Current Russian doctrine of engagement and specs for Su27 specifies that it must be able to engage an enemy aircraft within 360 degree horisontal and vertical (full sphere, no dead zones), lock it and track it without losing it from there on. If this statement is true, a Sukhoi can lock an aircraft behind it, hit the breaks, end up behind it and fire so this maneuver actually makes some sense. With an F14 (dunno about more recent) there is no lock acquired on an aircraft which is behind the fighter jet and the time for lock acquisition is not short enough for a lock to be acquired after the Tom Cruise Wannabie "hit the breaks".

Most older aircraft, yes, but it was possible and did happen with an F4:

Once again, he met the MiG-17 head-on, this time with an offset so he couldn't fire his guns. As he pulled up vertically he could again see his determined adversary a few yards away. Still gambling, Cunningham tried one more thing. He yanked the throttles back to idle and popped the speed brakes, in a desperate attempt to drop behind the MiG. But, in doing so, he had thrown away the Phantom's advantage, its superior climbing ability. And if he stalled out...

IIRC, they did something similar when they used F-4s to pace the liftoff of the early Mercury (Gemini?) missions. The F-4 would approach the rocket as it lifted off, then turn vertical and actually accelerate alongside it as the pilot performed a visual inspection for any stray connectors or hoses that hadn't detached properly. They actually had escape towers in those days, so if the pilot saw something potentially dangerous, they could yank the capsule off the rocket.

This post is complete and utter bollocks.First, the Cobra. The Cobra is a great-looking airshow maneuver that has zero utility in actual air combat. It's a high-alpha maneuver that does nothing but dump a whole lot of energy and gets nothing in return. "I'll hit the brakes, he'll fly right by" is a bullshit Hollywood thing that in real combat would get you dead as the guy who "flies right by"'s wingman now has you boresighted and you have no energy to do anything with. Moreover, the notion that American

Thrusters?1. It is called an exhaust, afterburner , or even a nozzle. Thursters are what the shuttle uses to maneuver with.2. Modern IR missiles can lock on to the heat of the airframe. A Cuban Mig 29 shot down a Skymaster with an IR missile. The Skymaster has two small piston engines.The Cobra isn't a great air combat maneuver. It may be useful to get a snap shot off at a target but as far as avoiding missiles goes it is useless. It is good at air shows. It kind of remindes me of a lot of feathers in sof

I recall reading in an air and space smithsonian magazine article over 10 years ago about how the Russians had developed an air-to-air missile that could fire backwards at a pursuing aircraft. Is there any chance that the newer Russian fighters have this capability? Then again, where the heck do they get the money to buy these things, I can't imagine that they have very many...

The USSR had aircraft which could fire rear-facing missles from as far back as the eary eighties. There was an exhaustive documenta [imdb.com]

On the other hand, with all the remakes and sequels that Hollywood is making,
we might just see a new movie about a cocky Iranian F14 pilot who temporarily lost faith in Allah and later recovered it through the help of his fully veiled and covered but nevertheless assumed sexy flight instructor.

I just heard some sad news on talk radio - US naval plane the F14 tomcat was found dead in its Maine home this morning. There were not any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss it - even if you did not enjoy flying it, there is no denying its contributions to popular culture. Truly an American icon.

To celebrate the flying of the last US F-14 it will be flown by Tom Cruise from Norfolk VA out to a carrier in the Atlantic. However the plane will only carry enough fuel to get it out a hundred miles out over the sea and will not have a functioning ejection seat. The carrier will also move during his flight to an undisclosed location. Fare thee well Tom!

The Grumman F-14D Tomcat is a twin-engine, two-seat supersonic airplane that in the years since the early 1970s was the Navy's primary fighter. Its battles with Russian-built MiGs over Vietnam made both planes famous.

The wings on the F-14 don't fold like other planes. The wings sweep back for supersonic flight and "oversweep" (to about 75 degrees) for storage. I believe the wingtips can also double fold up (like an "S") on the later F-14D models to save even more space. (There is no "C" model, a designation usually for single-seat fighters).

I live in Virginia Beach and F-14s have flown here for many, many years. They are cool planes, more so than the F-18s, and will be missed.

The F-14 uses a variable sweep wing, the idea being that for maneuverability the wings are extended and for speed the wings are swept back.

Nice idea eh? The problem is there are six hydraulic actuators on each wing to make this happen. When one breaks, there's no way to tell which one is bad without pulling all six from the wing and putting each one on a test bench. Testing a single actuator takes about an hour... and Murphy states the bad actuator is the last one you test.

The F-18 may look like a lawn dart from hell, but at least it's relatively easier to work on.

The swing wing was based on the lessons learnt from the F-111. Which incidently is still in service (with many local upgrades) with the Royal Australian Air Force. There is still nothing as capable for our needs in a single plane as the F111.

While your about it you might as well mention the negative experiences of the F18 down under, such as the double control inversion points (controls reverse themselves - a real oh shit moment) due to the fact that the damn thing twists longitudinally and laterally at speed. Not to mention the mods added to stop the damn tail ripping off during low altitude maneauvres that the aussies are so fond of. I hope the JSF isn't a dud. The F1-11 has been pretty good. Any piece of high tech has it's problems, you just need the right maintenance schedule.

To keep on topic, I think the F14 was a beautiful piece of Aviation history and it was designed in a time where thing got accomplished. The current state of the development of such things has reached a point where I'm amazed that anything actually ever gets achieved.

There is still nothing as capable for our needs in a single plane as the F111

No mention of the F-11 is complete without my favorite F-111 story:
As a money saving "common aircraft" plan shared between the Air Force and Navy (like the F-4 before it) the F-111 was originally intended to also fill the role of fleet defense fighter for the Navy (a role later filled by the F-14 instead). There was exactly one carrier landing in an F-111, by a test pilot early on. Due to poor low speed handling, heavy weight, and large size it was nigh impossible to land safely. The pilot was asked afterwards "if you had the choice between the F-111 and any other airplane for making a carrier landing, which would you choose?" His answer was, famously, "Any other airplane".

The F/A-18 means it's both a Fighter and also an Attack aircraft, which means is does neither as well as a plane designed specifically for that purpose. Meaning, the F/A-18 cannot carry as much ordinance as an A-6 nor dogfight as well as an F-14 or F-15.

That said, the F-14 is also one damned big plane compared to the F/A-18, despite how cool it may have looked. IANANA (I am not a naval aviator) so I can't say which flies better. I just know that when I was aboard CV-62 USS Independence, I was surprise

The F-14 was a very interesting plane. It was a dedicated interceptor, built for pure speed - not really made for dogfighting, no matter what Top Gun claimed. It also carried the most powerful air intercept radar in either the Navy or the Air Force inventory. The backseat guy was the Radar Intercept Officer - it took a dedicated crewman just to work the damn thing. It was kind of like a flying SAM platform, almost.

It had two main roles. First was the BARCAP role. The USA kept carrier groups on patrol in case the Soviets launched bomber strikes, and the F-14 was the first line of defense against them. The idea was that it could catch up with a Soviet bomber group before they reached launch range, lock onto the big bombers, fire its AIM-54s, and get out once the missiles went terminal. It wasn't supposed to mix it up with the escorting fighters, that was the job of escorting F-14s or the F-15s from the USAF. Once the USSR collapsed, BARCAP wasn't such a big deal, so that's when they decided to give it ground attack capability.

It was also tasked with Fleet Air Defense, meaning to protect the carrier air group from airborne threats - bombers dedicated to anti-ship strikes, cruise missiles, fighters scrambled to attack Navy bombers. In this role, it was obseleted by the AEGIS cruiser as much as the F/A-18.

I apologize in advance if I got any of the facts wrong - this is just as I remember it as a plane geek.

Size difference is not surprising when comparing a long range interceptor (F14) with a fighter (F18).

The tomcats primary purpose was as a long range interceptor/air superiority fighter (similar role to the F15 and the soviets MiG 25). Its job was to protect the fleet by destroying incoming supersonic bombers before they reached their launch range. It had to have legs, be fast, be able to track and launch at multiple targets at extreme range. It is a big powerful brute, but not that nimble.

Ok well I'm not that old, but I remember drooling over F4s in Okinawa back when I was knee high to a grasshopper. Probably would have ended up flying if my eyes hadn't taken a turn for the worse when I was 10. I reckon you can fix 'em now with those newfangled "lasers" but it's a bit too late to get started now...

It's hard to find any grown man today who hasn't seen the classic man-flick "Top Gun." By the same token it would be hard for any man not to be able to identify the F-14. A small slice of americana has officially slid into the past. It looked like the SUV of jet fighters, since it was so big, but it was sexy. It was meant to rule the sky, an air superiority fighter.

Hell yes, I admit I would love to fly at Mach 3 with my hair on fire, and have the call sign "Maverick." While over all I felt the military would be a poor choice of career for me due to my disrespect for authority, I always had a small fantasy to be able to fly an F-14.

I will briefly lament it's passing by wearing Axe body spray, putting on a navy uniform, and going out to bars to sing "She's Lost that Lovin' Feeling" to women who won't sleep with me.

It's hard to find any grown man today who hasn't seen the classic man-flick "Top Gun."

Surely you jest. I saw it, and being in the Navy at the time, hated it, since it was nothing like the real Navy, and apparently a chick-flick. There are emotional issues, a love conflict, (boy-meets-girl, boy-loses-girl, boy-gets-girl-again story line,) the men-playing-volleyball scene, and the ending with the protagonist confronting personal demons and finding self-actualization. Take away the F-14s, and it is your stereotypical chick-flick. I would say all it needs is Meg Ryan, but she's already there.

To be fair, I am kind of biased. Most (definitely not all) of the Navy (and other military) pilots I have known followed orders to the tee to safely complete their mission, and would never act like Maverick, so the whole screenplay is bull. Even the pilots who were bigger-penises-than-supernovae-would-require-to-re produce-if-they-were-mammals" would still follow orders. Additionally, I heard from one of the enlisted plane captains at Miramar at the time that Tom Cruise treated them like they were way low-class during filming. Way, way, uncool to treat the people responsible for the aircraft you are about to fly in like that. Apparently he's changed since then, but even so, I still consequently hate that movie, even more than most other chick-flicks.

So for most of its life, the Tomcat was basically a flying weapons platform for the AIM-54 Phoenix long-ass-range missile. The idea was at first to shoot down enemy planes, and after a while the idea became to shoot down enemy cruise missiles. The Phoenix was unique in that its range was ~100 miles, while I think the second best was AMRAAM, at ~30 miles, and didn't come out for a decade or two afterwards.So there's not really a replacement for the Phoenix in the modern inventory, unless somebody knows bet

Though why you'd want Phoenix when you've got Aegis cruisers defending the fleet remains an open question. So unless you want to shoot down enemy targets somewhere not over your fleet, Phoenix doesn't seem that neat anymore....

My father was an engineer at Hughes Aircraft Company, and spent the lion's share of his career working on the Phoenix program. The original design was for a 100% cold-war-turns-hot weapon. The AIM-54A was initially designed for shooting down big planes, like the Tu-95 Bear bomber, before they could get in range of the fleet to launch anti-ship cruise missiles. Later, as cruise missile standoff range increased, the Phoenix was improved to shoot down the missiles themselves. In modern small scale warfare where visual ID is nearly always required before pilots are allowed to fire, there's just no place for the Phoenix. Its only potential use was fleet defense when the Navy could be sure that anything flying in from "thataway" was definitely Soviet and hostile, i.e. World War Three. Amazing missile, and the stories I heard about how those engineers managed to wring every last bit of processing resources out of its tiny little 8-bit computer were astounding. I used to have hours of videotape of missile tests at China Lake where they'd shoot down F-86 drones. With the exception of one shot where the rocket motor didn't ignite*, every shot was a kill-- and they tried every evasive maneuver they could with those F-86's. Just no escape.

* second-sourced motor safety made incorrectly by the morons at Raytheon at fault there. I have almost as many stories about dumbfuck engineers from Raytheon "reinterpreting" design drawings to save money on manufacture and thereby delivering unusable missile parts. Now Raytheon has bought up all the US missile designers/manufacturers, Hughes included. One wonders how a company that's run so badly ends up owning the whole show, but I'll save rants about congressional lobbyists for another time...

Rather like the F-4 "Phantom," in the late '60s and the '70s, the F-14 was probably the most idealized fighter for an entire generation of kids in the '80s. Something about the design - the graceful lines, or the swing wings, perhaps - just made it more romantic than either the F-15 or F-16 to my mind. I got to see one at an airshow once, afterburners on and all, which was a treat given that I don't live on the coast.

Children of the '90s have their F-22s, and F-117s, to admire, I suppose. For the rest, the postively ancient B-52 still lives.

I was sad to see the F-4 fade away over the course of the '80s, though I wasn't around for its heyday. The same with the F-111 - the last true fighter-bomber (as opposed to strike fighter) in U.S. service. I have to wonder if the "Tomcat" won't be the last pure air-combat-fighter/interceptor ever put into production for the U.S. armed forces.

There's one thing that I haven't understood about the F-14 and AIM-56 for a long time. Every time people talk about them, a big deal is made out of the fact that it can track and fire missiles at so many targets at once, as though this is a unique or unusual feature.

Maybe it is, but I don't get why. AFAIK, the F-14 still just has one radar dish in the nosecone, right? So shouldn't the ability to track targets merely be a computers and software issue? That makes it kind of neat for 1970, but every year that goes by, should make it that much more trivial. Shouldn't every modern plane have this capability by now?

Or does this have something to do with the sensors in the Phoenix? (But if so, then why can't planes with AMRAAMs do the same thing?)

Couple of things. You have to understand what "to track" means. What specifically they are talking about with the AIM-54/AWG-9 weapons system is that it can engage 6 targets at once.

The AIM-54 Phoenix is guided initially by the F-14's AWG-9 radar is what is known as "semi-active radar homing". The missile sees the reflections off the target from the F-14's radar. Once the missile gets close enough, it spins up its own active radar which will take over terminal guidance.

"Old school" radars are directed mechanically (the dish actually moves left and right and up and down). To track a target, the dish points directly at the target instead of scanning back and forth. With the AIM-7 Sparrow for example, (a SARH missile) the firing aircraft could track one and only one target. With the AWG-9, a Tomcat can divide its attention among 6 targets at once, providing guidance for 6 missiles in the air at once. This was a Big Deal at the time. Now with electronically scanned array radars, it is a LOT easier to do (no pointing a physical dish).

The AIM-120 AMRAAM is guided initially by an inertial system (the firing plane tells it the target info, location, speed, etc) then when it gets close enough it starts looking for the target with its own radar. This leaves the firing platform free to do whatever it wants, there is no initial need to provide target illumination like with the Phoenix. Thus, with AMRAAMs you can engage as many targets as you have missiles. The AIM-120 is a damn fine missile, you have to keep in mind the AIM-54 was in service before the AMRAAM was even a glimmer in an engineer's eye.

The "defoliants" were used to remove the jungle cover in a few areas in Viet-Nam where VC/NVA activity was prolific and hidden under the forest canopy. It is arguable that it achieved its purpose. It was "policy" not to spray it directly onto population. The lingering after affect is less about poisons than about the totally denuded terrain left behind, that saw topsoil torn away and lost in the following monsoons. Wet deserts. I don't know if the areas have recovered yet - maybe?

Oddly enough, the "F" in F-14 stands for "FIghter"; I give you my personal guarantee that a U.S. Navy F-14 never dropped an agent orange bomb on vietnam.Considering that all F-14's were pure fighter, as in no strike capability, until after I got out of the military in '91, I sort of doubt that they dropped any other type of bomb on vietnam, either.

I don't doubt that it didn't drop Agent Orange. I'll take your word for it that it didn't.

I'm just sarcastically pointing out that the point is moot - the Tomcat was a killing machine - I see no reason for us all to feel sentimental for something being "retired" (anthropomorphism anyone?) that existed on this earth for the sole reason of killing human beings.

I see no reason for us all to feel sentimental for something being "retired" (anthropomorphism anyone?) that existed on this earth for the sole reason of killing human beings.

Pure fighter aircraft are defensive weaponry, not offensive weaponry. They are used in the first instance to intercept bombers. Of course if you know your bombers are going to be intercepted you will deploy fighters alongside your bombers to intercept the fighters intercepting your bombers, but even in that case they are defending t

... but they can be compared. Kind of like the cardinality [wikipedia.org] of infinite sets.

... existed on this earth for the sole reason of killing human beings.

It sucks to have to kill people, but you must be prepared to do it to prevent other killings and/or misery — deemed greater by some measure or another.

People have always been fascinated with things beautiful, weapons included — consider the swords and the firearms collections, for example. The fascination with a fighter plane is perfectly legitimate too.

"the Tomcat was a killing machine - I see no reason for us all to feel sentimental for something being "retired" (anthropomorphism anyone?) that existed on this earth for the sole reason of killing human beings."

The only thing the Tomcat was intended to "kill" were enemy bombers. They were built as super fast planes with weaponry that could reach out and touch air targets (bombers, specifically). They initially had no ground capability whatsoever. Their primary offensive weaponry couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, let alone a highly manueverable fighter aircraft. However, they could swoop in quickly, unload on large bomber groups (taking down huge numbers of bombers), and then run like hell from the escort aircraft.

The purpose of the Tomcat was to take down Russian bombers before Russian bombers carpet-bombed and/or dropped nuclear weapons on American cities. It wasn't a killing machine; it was a tool of deterrence. Without reason to believe their bombers would never make it to American shores, the Soviets would have felt a lot more comfortable launching a crippling first attack on America. ICBMs can only do but so much damage. Bombers, on the other hand, could cripple our counter-attack capability and nullify MAD.

In other words, the Tomcat served to help prevent what could have easily been the bloodiest and most destructive conflict in all of human history.

Considering that all F-14's were pure fighter, as in no strike capability, until after I got out of the military in '91, I sort of doubt that they dropped any other type of bomb on vietnam, either.

While its true that the F-14's [wikipedia.org] primary role throughout its length of service has been as an air-to-air interceptor, it could indeed drop bombs. I don't know that the F-14 did any bombing in Vietnam (the US Navy had several aircraft to fill this role, most notably the A-6 Intruder which was in service well into t

Well you're half right. They weren't designed with air-to-ground in mind, but it was modified to perform in a limited strike role later on. They did pretty well over Libya, and I believe they dropped some bombs in Iraq and maybe Afghanistan as well.
From http://www.airtoaircombat.com/background.asp?id=14 &bg=8 [airtoaircombat.com]
The F-14A can carry up to 14,500 pounds of bombs and rockets, although it was not originally assigned a ground-attack mission. The under-fuselage pallets which ordinarily carry Phoenix missiles can also mount bomb racks for 1000-pound Mk 83 or 2000-pound Mk 84 bombs or other free-fall weaponry. As early as 1972, a Tomcat flew with 18 Mk 82 bombs, plus a complement of missiles. VF-122 dropped the first bombs from a Fleet Tomcat on August 8, 1990. Although the F/A-18 Hornet is the primary air-to-ground aircraft of the Navy fleet squadrons, the F/A-18 is felt to lack a sufficient range/payload capacity, and the air-to-ground capable F-14 Tomcat was felt to be essential to permit a carrier-based air wing to retain its full capacity. However, there were initially some shortages of bomb racks, and it was often true that only one F-14 squadron on each carrier was equipped to carry out a secondary ground attack role, with the other squadron being TARPS-equipped. Software for a ground attack mission has now been installed on all F-14Bs and Ds, as well on some F-14As. Today, the training syllabus includes some emphasis on air-to-ground strike, although such missions would only be carried out in a relatively permissible combat environment because of the high cost of the Tomcat.

They weren't designed with air-to-ground in mind, but it was modified to perform in a limited strike role later on. They did pretty well over Libya, and I believe they dropped some bombs in Iraq and maybe Afghanistan as well

The modified Tomcat capable of ground attack (F-14D) was first delivered in 1990. They did indeed see service in southwest asia, but definitely not in Libya. You're conflating the numerous air-to-air faceoffs between Libyan forces (including shooting down a Libyan Su-22 in 1981) and US Navy F-14A's, and the US Air Force bombing Libya with F-111's in 1986. No bomb off an F-14 has ever fallen on Libya.

That is an interesting read. I wonder how the 20 bit converters were designed. They do not say but if they were used for what would be considered an instrumentation application and had 18 bits of linearity, I would assume some type of charge balancing scheme or single slope integrating. I doubt I could do better then 16 bits on the first shot with a discrete design.

I was looking at data on the Commodore 64 ( I had nothad one when they came out, we could not afford it,but I found one for free on Craigslist, so I was justlooking ) and I came across the above. Google foundit again for me. I cant add anything to the article,unfortunately. But very cool.

Because slamming them into carrier decks and parking them in salt water spray incurs no maintenece cost. Those things could just be used forever, if it weren't for that damn Military Industrial War Complex.

The US navy at one point had at least 699 [fas.org] F14's in service or on order (that sounds incredibly high, is it a typo on fas.org?), at a per-copy cost of $38,000,000, plus maintainence costs with exceed procurement costs over the lifetime of each aircraft. So figure $56,000,000,000.

Now here's a little quiz for your flight-sim jockeys out there. Guess how many bogeys the F14 shot down 34 year run, in total? Guess before you read the answer.

Well, yes. The plane was designed for air superiority combat against a capable contemporary air force (read, the Red Air Force). Since we thankfully never fought a full war with the Soviet Union, we never had a chance to use the Tomcat for its intended purpose (in the Gulf War, Iraq refused to face our Tomcats, knowing its air force would be slaughtered). Similarly, we never used our arsenal of nuclear missiles, our subs, or any of other huge classes of weapons for their designed purpose, either.

Now, it's possible that if we'd never built these weapons of war to fight the Soviet Union, people like Brezhnev wouldn't have taken the opportunity to conquer Western Europe or at least extort from it money to prop up the Soviet Union, and accordingly the only reason we built them was to fund a military-industrial complex. It's similarly possible that, had Danzig been handed over to Hitler when he demanded it, World War II would have been averted, and the only reason Chamberlain stood up to Hitler in 1939 was to please Britsh armaments manufacturers.

Chamberlain left office after declaring war on Germany for its invasion of Poland, after refusing to fold on Hitler's demand for Danzig.

Did he screw up royally on Czechoslovakia? Did he totally misestimate Hitler in 1938? Yes, of course he did. And he knew he did, which is why he stepped down so somebody credible could take over the war effort. But Chamberlain did stand up to Hitler in the end.

Actually, there's a fair amount of evidence that the Russians never did have intentions beyond holding the WarPac line, and the main reason for their massive arms spend was an utter refusal to fight the Great Patriotic War again. I don't follow it terribly closely, but just as the US would claim it never intended to start a war, the Russians can quite plausibly make the same claim.

There's also a fair amount of evidence that prior to the Great Patriotic War Stalin was hoping that Nazi Germany and the UK would beat the shit out of each other so that the Soviet Union could pick up the shattered pieces of Western Europe.

You think they would have stopped at Berlin if we hadn't had a few million troops in Europe when Germany surrendered? You are dreaming. Ask Finland or the Baltic States what it was like to be nextdoor to Stalinist Russia.

US carrier groups have been pretty underutilized since WWII in terms of their capital cost (the Nimitz cost a couple of billion with a B, and I think she's seen action near Libya once and did some support during the first Gulf War, and thats about it). But the entire purpose of being the biggest guy on the block is that so your fighter aces can grow old and die without ever seeing combat. Every time Communist Russia thought the prospect of universal socialism could be achieved faster by rolling over Western Germany, every time a tinpot dictator thinks "Hmm, starving my people for the last couple of decades has given me enough tanks to crush my neighbor... sounds appealing", every time Kim Jon Quackpot gets tired of eating grass and thinks "Hey I could get some sweet kimchi if I could take a quick vacation in the burning remains of Seoul", they look to the horizon and see a distinct absence of US military ready to kick their ass. And they remember that that could change tomorrow if we had a reason to change it. And so their tanks stay parked collecting rust while they scavenge parts to bring a couple out to the parade ground.

Of course, some folks and even some nation-states occasionally decide "Eh, the Americans were probably kidding about actually using that whole military machine thing". Hiya, Saddam, tell me: how did that invasion of Kuwait go for you again?

Apparently the Iranians added substantially to that score during the first Gulf war. Ironically enough, and if your information on Tomact air victories in US service is reliable, that means that the majority of F-14 Tomcat victories were achieved by the air force of the Islamic Republic of Iranian. It took Iran a while to recover their capability to operate the Tomcat after the revolution but when they did the Tomcat had an easy time especially vs. Iraqi MiG-21s, MiG-23s and assorted helicopters since the Iraqis only got pretty low grade export variants from the Soviets and had nothing capable of matching the Tomcat on any level until they got MiG-25 and Mirage fighters with good radar warning receivers, modern intercept radars and the all important long range missiles. Of course all this happened while Saddam was still America's friend and <sarcasm> before he joined the axis-of-evil </sarcasm>. What is really amazing is that Iran still manages to operate the Tomcat today 27 years after the revolution without manufacturer support.

Gee - and the average policemans gun is fired in anger how many times during it's life? Prior to the current war in Iraq you could pretty much say the same thing for the average Military rifle, or artillery piece, or tank, or machine gun...

Have it, and hope you don't need it is a LOT better than Need it - and don't have it

One of the biggest problems with those old jets is the massive number of ground service hours required for every hour of air time. The F-14 was one of the worst. Not to mention that maintaining a certain level of air superiority might require X of an older type of jet, versus 1/4X of a newer type of jet [strategypage.com].

Often you can save money buy spending money.

And those old F-14s aren't immediately ground up into Bender sandwiches -- They usually go to a graveyard [google.com] to sit around in a state of somewhat possibly potentially close to readiness, just in case a really big war breaks out.

Im an avionics tech crrently stationed at NAS Oceana, and im not sorry to see them go because of this. F-18 gear is way easier and faster to work on. Not to mention a lower failure rate. That being said, alot of the older guys and pilots are sad to see them go.

Funny you should mention that. My former linear algebra teacher used to work for SPAWAR back in the 60s-70s. He spent years collecting data on (at that time) existing aircraft and applying it to various formulas (mainly least square matrices, which is why he brought it up) to estimate the GSH/flight. He determined that it would be a maintenance nightmare and recommended against it. They ignored him and made the jets anyway.He cited that as the key reason why he decided to teach. He thought that once in

I don't know if you've noticed, but there are still well-armed enemies out there. From asian warlords (which have made a resurgence) to respectably armed organized crime groups, to dictatorships like Pakistan and Iran, to any old jackass militia that decides it doesn't like taxation and wants to overthrow the government.

Ultimately, there is no escape from the fact that the government must always have the greatest capacity for violence. It is the basis of orderly society. Otherwise, how could the govern

According to the Congressional Budget Office [cbo.gov], the total US Federal Budget for 2006 was projected to be approximately $2,507 Billion. Of that, defense is $438 Billion, Social Security is $540 Billion, Medicare is $380 Billion, and Medicaid is $193 Billion. Social welfare dwarfs military spending now, and it will skyrocket over the next 30 years or so as the US baby boom generation is starting to retire.

Still, $438 Billion is all weapons, right? Well... no. Depending on the year, Defense spending [whitehouse.gov], is about 23% for personnel (pay, benefits), 31% for operations and maintenance (fuel & parts), and 15% for R&D. Procurement is a stunning 18%. That is about 3% of the total Federal budget. But not even all of that 3% goes to buying weapons. A sizable chunk of it goes to ship building for the Navy, for example. Another chunk goes to buying ammo. There are plenty of other things, like fire fighting equipment, periscopes, and pollution control equipment, night vision gear, and construction equipment.

The Federal budget also doesn't include state income taxes for which an even smaller percentage is going to go for defense related expenses. City and county taxes don't contribute anything either.

Overall, a minute percentage of American taxes goes to new weapons.

(I guess protest signs wouldn't look so scary if they complained that the US spent 1.6% of its Federal budget on weapons.)

But not even all of that 3% goes to buying weapons. A sizable chunk of it goes to ship building for the Navy, for example. Another chunk goes to buying ammo.

Last time I checked warships counted as weapons. Or is the Navy building cruiseships?

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not a flower child by any means. But the grandparent has a point even if his numbers are flawed. We spend way too much money on our military. You'd think that the several thousand deliverable nuclear warheads would be enough to ensure o

Except in order to ensure our safety you need to be willing to use those nucular warheads. And we all know the likelihood of that. So our enemies do *just enough* damage to inflict pain, but not incur the wrath of a full nucular response.

So with conventional weapons, however, you now have a way of responding without a full-out nuclear response.

And we need 13 CVBGs and 24 B-2s to respond to, what exactly? Terrorism? No other nation-state is going to attack the United States. The nuclear deterrent seems to be pretty effective when dealing with them. And terrorism can be solved by a combination of better security, human intelligence, and *gasp* addressing the underlying issues that make us unpopular with "John Q. Public" in the Muslim World. Like our one-sided support of Israel and our past transgressions with supporting ruthless dictatorships.

None of those things can be addressed with more M-1 tanks, Nimitz class carriers or F-22s.

That's no big deal. Well-maintained military aircraft last a long time. The newest B-52 in the US Air Force's inventory is 44 years old, and the Air Force plans to keep flying them until 2050! That's right: when they retire them, the newest one will be 88 years old.

They explained that at some air-show I saw. They where displaying some Mirage 2000 model and they explained how this version differed at lot with the previous one because of a completly different avionics package and engine. They look a lot (same basic shape), but behave and perform totally differently. I guess it's like trying out a Audi A4 and comparing it to a RS4. Looks mostly the same, but the specs are radically different